Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society

Newspaper cartoons can graphically display the results of ambiguity in human sketch. This result can be unexpected and funny. Captioned cartoons derive their humor from a sudden incongruity which can be made to follow by a human being who can automatically use stored world knowledge to resolve the ambiguous situation. Likewise computer analysis of natural language statements also needs to successfully resolve ambiguous situations. Computerized understanding of dialogue that takes place between humans must not only include syntactical and semantical analysis but also pragmatical analysis. Pragmatics consists of an understanding of the speaker's intentions, the context of the utterance, and social implications of polite human communication.